Hell Or High Water. Anne Mather

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ Manning’s cool tones were as incisive as his words. ‘I realise showing me around your home is obviously distasteful for you, and believe me, I can do without the guided tour.’

      Helen was too stunned to answer him, and ignoring her offended expression, he opened the door to their left. ‘A bedroom, right?’ he suggested, glancing about its generous proportions. ‘Very nice. Next?’

      Pressing her lips together, Helen showed him all the bedrooms on the first floor, including her own, although she had made sure to put all her belongings away so that nothing should signify that this room was hers more than any of the others. The adjoining bathrooms she left to him, saying only that some of the bedrooms had been made over when the plumbing was modernised.

      ‘There is a second floor,’ she added stiffly, after he had admired the master suite which was presently unoccupied. ‘We don’t use it, so I expect it may be very dusty, but it’s habitable if one needs more rooms.’

      ‘I don’t expect to,’ Jarret remarked dryly. ‘I see you have some central heating. I hope it wasn’t installed when the Prince Regent came to visit.’

      ‘No. It was installed after the second world war——’ began Helen seriously, and then stopped when she realised what he had asked. The fact that he had caught her out so easily was irritating, and she indicated the narrow passage that led to the second floor staircase with evident resentment.

      ‘Don’t you ever relax?’ Jarret enquired, accompanying her back along the gallery to the first floor landing, and when she didn’t answer this, added: ‘I suppose these lighter patches on the walls are where your—great-great-grandfather’s paintings used to hang, is that right?’ indicating the oblong squares visible between the panelled doors. ‘What happened? Are they in storage, did they fall to pieces—or have they been sold?’

      ‘I imagine you know the answer to that, Mr Manning,’Helen declared stiffly, disliking his perspicacity. ‘Had we a valuable collection of paintings to sell, we would hardly be selling the house, would we?’

      ‘Not to a philistine like me, no,’ he agreed solemnly, and she glanced sideways at him, sure that he was mocking her again.

      ‘Why do you want King’s Green, Mr Manning?’ she demanded, halting at the head of the stairs. ‘It—it’s not your—your scene really, is it? Don’t you want a—a pad nearer town?’

      He grinned at this, an outright humorous grin that unexpectedly reacted on her like a blow to the solar plexis. She had reluctantly admitted his attraction before, but she had had no idea how irresistible his smile might be. Now, with the lighter creases beside his eyes deepening to reveal laughter lines, and the thin lips parting over slightly uneven white teeth, he was devastating.

      ‘Oh, Helen!’ he gulped, and the suppressed amusement in his voice briefly distracted her from the realisation that he had used her name. ‘How would you know what my—scene is? And as for my having a pad—God!’ He shook his head, and adopting a distinctly Bogart-like accent, added: ‘Stick to your own territory, sweetheart!’

      Helen felt a second’s overwhelming impulse to giggle, but then common sense came to the rescue, and the awareness of what she was doing here and his part in it sobered her instantly.

      ‘I don’t know what you mean, Mr Manning,’ she affirmed, with all the contempt she could muster. ‘Shall we go downstairs?’

      ‘In a minute …’ He, too, had sobered, and as she moved to the head of the stairs his cool fingers closed about her arm. They successfully prevented her from moving away from him, and within their grasp she was conscious of his nearness and the disturbing magnetism his smile had generated. ‘Tell me something,’ he said, his thumb massaging her flesh almost without his being aware of it, ‘what did I do to arouse so much resentment? I didn’t ask to come here. I was invited. I was given the obviously mistaken impression that your mother wanted to sell thehouse, but if she doesn’t then I shan’t lose any sleep over it, Miss Chase.’

      Helen held up her head. ‘I—why—my mother does want to sell the house,’ she admitted unwillingly.

      ‘And you don’t?’

      ‘It’s not my house to sell.’

      ‘But if it were?’

      Helen moved her shoulders helplessly, avoiding those blue eyes which seemed to have the cutting strength of steel. ‘I—I expect I might have to,’ she conceded, and with an exclamation he let her go.

      ‘But not to me,’ he inferred coldly, and she turned away from him to descend the stairs without giving him a reply.

      Several rooms opened off the hall below. The drawing room, the music room, the dining room, the library—Helen did not know which to choose after their contretemps upstairs, and she waited for him to join her before making a decision. Jarret, however, seemed in no hurry to continue, and she had to wait some minutes while he examined the carving on the balustrade.

      ‘Grinling——’ began Helen reluctantly, only to have him interrupt her words.

      ‘—Gibbons. Yes, I know,’ he finished sardonically. ‘Only Gibbons died in 1720, so how do you account for that, if the house wasn’t completed until much later?’

      Helen’s face flamed. No one had ever questioned the authenticity of the carving before, and it was disconcerting to have him do so. It was true that the likelihood of Gibbons having completed the carving was in some doubt, and her father’s assessment had been that it had probably been a pupil of Gibbons who accomplished the work.

      ‘I—it’s open to speculation that—that perhaps it was a pupil of Gibbons who completed the carving,’ she admitted. ‘But the style is his, and that’s what’s important.’

      ‘Is it?’ He descended the final few stairs to stand beside her. ‘A connoisseur might disagree with you.’

      Helen tilted her chin, annoyed that she still had to look up to him, despite her five feet six inches. ‘Are you a connoisseur, Mr Manning?’ she enquired as coolly as she could, and the humour in his expression annoyed her almost more than his sarcasm had done.

      ‘You obviously don’t think so,’ he said, pushing back his hair with lazy fingers, his eyes far too knowing for her peace of mind. ‘Shall we go on?’

      As he had already seen the drawing room, Helen opened the doors into the dining room, standing back as he passed her to walk thoughtfully round the well-proportioned room. The panelled window embrasures overlooked the gardens at the side of the house, and attracting as it did the early sun, it provided a warm oasis on colder mornings. It had always been one of Helen’s favourite rooms, and she waited with some reluctance for his verdict. It was an elegant room, the beige walls hung with panels of moiré silk, the carpets, with their distinctive design, brought back many years ago from the Caucasus. Much of the furniture was not original, however, although the dinner service residing in the long serving sideboards was Worcestershire porcelain. Ruched curtains framed long windows, and were matched in the deep blue cushions of the chairs that faced one another across the hearth.

      ‘Do you use this room often?’ Jarret queried, indicating the damask cloth and silverware which Mrs Hetherington had laid ready for lunch, and Helen hesitated.

      ‘If—if you mean, do we give many dinner parties nowadays, the answer is no,’ she replied at length, watching him push his СКАЧАТЬ